We've moved !!!!!!!!!!

עברנו בית

We have a new home now for our Pre-Diagnosis Survivors group.  The link is:
http://goldenaspies.proboards.com/

The new interface is much more user friendly, and allows for much more interaction, so we're very active and having some very interesting discussions.

Let me know if you want assistance registering.

Hoping to see you with us!

Daphna

Beautiful!

Go to this page and enjoy!

http://dudeimanaspie.blogspot.com/

Daphna

למה שמבוגר ילך לאבחון אספרגר

Why get a diagnosis at all?

• You're curious
• You want validation for your limitations that are due to AS
• You want professional validation
• You want a professional's diagnosis to show to your loved ones or manager at work
• You want to request accomodations at work for the limitations that AS/Autism pose in your specific work life
• You're not able to find and/or keep a job due to some of your AS traits and you need Social Security to help you survive.

Why NOT get a diagnosis?. 

• At least in my case, I "knew" I was the AS type the moment I read the list of traits of AS in the DSM-4 (the book that lists the psychiatric disorders and syndromes).  I also knew, later on, that I'm an NLD type of AS.  I fit all the NLD traits to a T.  Some say NLD is a common presentation of AS in women and girls.  Just like everything else, this is not scientifically or statistically proven to any satisfactory degree.  So this is one reason I didn't need a diagnosis.  I felt I knew myself better than any professional could assess in the much shorter time they have to get to know me than the time I've known myself.
• A diagnosis is an expensive, stressing and sometimes painful process.  It's also risky: you could be misdiagnosed with AS, with something else, or with nothing.  Especially in the case of women, where AS presents in ways that make many experts rule out AS.
• There are not many knowledgeable, reliable experts out there in the field of AS, and those who diagnose adults can be counted with the fingers of one hand, are very hard to find and have a long waiting list.

Whether to go for diagnosis will depend largely on your personal circumstances, but it's important to make an educated decision, and not one based on false information, unfounded fears, ignorance of what there is to expect.  So I'll share my process to diagnosis with you in the next post.

Daphna

הכל אודות אבחון אספרגר אצל מבוגרים !!

Asperger's Diagnosis of Adults - All you wanted to know!

I've been asked several very important and interesting questions:
1.  Should I seek a diagnosis?  Why?  What brought you to seek a diagnosis?
2.  Where did you turn for a diagnosis, as an adult?
3.  What's the diagnosis process?
4.  How many sessions are necessary?
5.  How much does it cost?
6.  What should I be careful about?
7.  What should I make sure I receive after diagnosis?
8.  And after diagnosis...what?
I'll be answering each and every one of these questions in full detail in the next posts.  Stay tuned!

Daphna

A Group for Pre-Diagnosis Era Aspies!!

Below is the link to Pre-DiagnosisSurvivors, the international list on Yahoo, set up by SparrowRose and myself, for those of us who want a corner to ourselves to discuss the very unique issues we face, having discovered AS / NLD / HFA / etc. "too late" to gear our studies, careers, professions and lives in general according to the new insight.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Pre-DiagnosisSurvivors/

Because better late than never!

We only started last night and we already have almost 20 members!!

Hope to see you "oldies" with us soon! (mention you were referred from AWA Israel blog)

Daphna

Hear Ari Neeman from ASAN (Aspie advocation to be done by Aspies only!)

This Saturday morning we will be protesting Autism Speaks' continued exploitation of Autistic people and speaking about us without us in Washington DC. Details: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=166232858105&index=1

Nothing About Us, Without Us!

Ari Ne'eman
President
The Autistic Self Advocacy Network
http://www.autisticadvocacy.org/

Photo: Ari Ne'eman with First Lady Michelle Obama

Listen to AWA Radio interviewing Ari Ne'eman next Tuesday at 2:00 am Israel time, on AWA Radio (link on the right)

The Pre-Diagnostic Era Aspie

Was informed today that a former coworker - a Boss who recommended me to replace him when he moved on (which never happened and is a whole NT social circus of it's own), passed away last month (age 46) of an apparent suicide.

Oddly, when I first realized I had AS, even before formal diagnosis, there were a handful of people I'd known over the years whom I suspected might also have been on the spectrum, and this man was one of those.

Sadly, like me, he had been locked into a single specific profession for his entire life (obsessive interest) and had no training or experience in anything else. Due to changes in the industry over the past decade or more, jobs in that field have become extremely scarce and barely resemble the work we had grown to love and at which we had come to excel.

Like me, he had become lost and at loose ends as to where to find a place in the world outside that career. After several years of unemployment, during which the wife he adored left him, he apparently opted to end his life.

Fortunately for me, during an identical period of professional implosion, I discovered the name for my handicap and managed to grasp the lifeline of SSDI Disability. Else, I no doubt would have come to the same conclusion.

Yet, as I have discovered painfully throughout the process, for those of us who grew up with AS before its inclusion in the DSM, in the public consciousness we don't exist. Autism is a children's malady. Autistic adults are invisible.

If HFA in adults were recognized as a genuine handicap by the media, my friend might have discovered that his difficulties were not personal failings and may have found some lifeline that kept him from ultimate despair.

He had been on my mind quite frequently the past few months. I only wish I could have found him before it was too late.

I - and I strongly suspect he - and many of our generation, have been autistic children. God Damn the society that treats those as if autism disappears at 18. For most of us, that's when the real problems are only beginning.

Written by my friend Willard on WrongPlanet.  Thank you, Willard, for this wonderful letter.  Alien visual: courtesy of WrongPlanet.Net